Weekend Shenanigans

Last weekend was our town's birthday celebration, and the Saturday night events included cake in the town circle, along with a free concert, various vendor booths, and fireworks. Or, as it was according to Brigid...FIREWORKS!!!!!!#$%#&*#?!!!!! Because, yeah...the kid loves her fireworks.

We headed over Saturday evening with a picnic dinner, and I was a little concerned, given how long we were going to be there, waiting for it to get dark enough for the fireworks, that Caitlin was going to be an absolute mess by the end of the night. She...was not.

Did you know babies (well, some babies, anyway) could be flexible in their scheduling? Did you know that if they get tired, those flexible babies will just...fall asleep? Wherever they are? I DID NOT KNOW THIS! I swear, I was the schedule enforcer with Brigid, and we never took her anywhere that would have her up past her bedtime, because I was sure that anything in the evening would ruin her sleep schedule for the month and a half following whatever that event was. And maybe it would have. But also, MAYBE NOT! Because Caitlin fell asleep on her bottle, and then let me put her down, still sleeping, in the wagon for awhile. Even with the music and the people and the general tomfoolery, she slept. And when she got tired of sleeping in the wagon? She fell back asleep in my arms, AND SLEPT THROUGH THE ENTIRE FIREWORK SHOW!!! She woke up on the trip home, but she went back to sleep again when we got her settled in for the night. I'm STILL in shock over how well that whole thing worked, even though she did basically the same thing during an evening baseball game a couple of weeks ago. I just don't EVER expect it to work.

Side note: Second kids, man. It is so much easier to be more laid-back with your second kid. Brigid is going to hate this, come the teenaged years.

And speaking of Brigid, she got her hair done while we were there. And she was thrilled...

It was so funny to watch her in action while we were waiting for the fireworks. There was a group of kids sitting next to us, watching something on someone's phone, and she just tried to make herself right at home with the group, squatting down in front of them to watch whatever they were watching over the top of the screen. It was adorable, and heartbreaking, all at once, because all I could focus on was the thought that maybe they don't want her bothering them? They were all older than her, what if one of them said something that made her sad? I am not READY for her to start branching out and trying to make new friends. She is my baby, and she should be happy hanging out with just her mommy. Forever. I DO NOT APPROVE OF THIS INDEPENDENCE THING.

Then two little girls in the bathroom line told her that her hair was beautiful, and she smiled the biggest smile I'd ever seen, and my heart broke into a million pieces because holy hell do I love that little girl more than anything else in the entire world (except for maybe the baby who was milk drunk and passed out in the wagon while all of this was going on...), and I will do everything in my power to keep that smile on her face as much as possible. 

I'm so incredibly lucky that these are my girls. I swear, I must have been someone completely amazing in my previous life to deserve having these two in this one.